If the time has come to replace your dining table, you’re sure to be slightly overwhelmed by the vast selection of both stockists and design options. It’s hard to know where to begin — do you want your table made of wood, metal, or lacquered wood? What style or era would you like to encapsulate — mid-century modern, cottage chic, or industrial?
Finding a balance between aesthetic wants and practical needs can be challenging, especially if home décor and interior design aren’t your forte. For these reasons, have you considered how a reclaimed dining table might tick many of your boxes — stylish, versatile, and hardwearing? Here are just a few of the benefits of a reclaimed dining table for the modern home.
Reclaimed Furniture Intersects Multiple Design Aesthetics
Generally speaking, a dining table that’s made using reclaimed wood will have a rustic, earthy wooden top with powder-coated metal legs.
Due to this visual adaptability, reclaimed wood dining tables fit seamlessly into a wide variety of kitchen styles. This is a huge bonus: interior design styles and trends are consistently changing — every year, in fact! Furthermore, this versatility is beneficial if you plan on moving in the foreseeable future, as you won’t know what fixtures and fittings your new kitchen will have, nor how it will be styled.
Another boon for reclaimed dining tables is that most dining chairs will complement reclaimed materials. For example, whether you want plush high-back velvet chairs or industrial wire chairs, they’re sure to work well with your reclaimed table.
Ultimately, you can quite easily find reclaimed wood tables for any aesthetic.
Reclaimed Furniture Is an Environmentally Sound Option
While new mass-produced furniture pieces are often crafted using virgin wood, reclaimed pieces are made using salvaged lumber.
Yes, there’s a carbon footprint involved in sourcing, transporting, and refinishing reclaimed wood; however, the environmental impact is minute compared to those made from virgin products. The creation of new furniture involves the felling of trees, which directly contributes to deforestation, loss of habitat for wildlife, and greenhouse gas emissions — in large areas where trees are harvested, their stored carbon is released. These trees obviously also lose their ability to sequester carbon. These environmental strains are in addition to the transportation and vigorous processing that virgin wood undergoes.
Reclaimed Dining Tables Are One of a Kind
Knowing that you own a piece of furniture that is 100% unique certainly gives it a special edge — it’s never to be duplicated and impossible to recreate. This is because reclaimed furniture is often made using old barn beams, vintage railway sleepers, beer barrels and timber from old factories — to name just a few sources.
This rarity offers not only a truly one-of-a-kind piece of furniture, but also means you have a piece of history in your kitchen or dining room, which is a great talking point!
Reclaimed Dining Tables Are Hard Wearing
One of the main merits of reclaimed lumber is that it’s incredibly durable. It’s said that reclaimed wood is around 40 points harder than virgin wood on the Janka hardness scale — a test devised to measure the resistance of wood to wear, tear and denting.
This is especially beneficial in homes with young children, homes thatregularly host elaborate dinner parties and houses with many residents.
While the upfront costs of reclaimed furniture may seem steep, the durability and consequential longevity that these pieces offer far outweigh the financial cons — it’s said that the average maximum lifespan of mass-produced furniture is 10 years. In contrast, a piece of reclaimed furniture is seriously made to last. That said, due to the merits of reclaimed furniture, should you wish to sell the piece later down the line for whatever reason, the resell value will be significantly higher than that for a piece of MDF furniture.
The Bottom Line
The initial cost of well-made reclaimed furnituremay be steeper than its mass-produced counterparts, as you can see. However, the long-term pros of reclaimed furniture far outweigh the short-term cons.
Reclaimed furniture is aesthetically pleasing, unique, versatile, hard-wearing and made to last. If you’re considering changing your dining set this year, give serious consideration to a reclaimed dining table — you won’t be disappointed.